Ever since I first moved here in 1994 and especially after I started this blog, I’ve been asked the question, “Is Las Vegas a safe place to live?”
My answer is, “I am not concerned about crime – any more than when I lived in Cleveland (where I was mugged once) or New York (and had to daily deal with subway-station issues). Why do you ask?”
The answers to “Why do you ask” vary from the ill-informed to the hilarious to the pathetic.
“I’ve always heard that Las Vegas was very dangerous.” (I’ll deal with that below.)
“I remember the movie Casino.” (Which is funny, because long-time residents tell me that Las Vegas was an extremely safe town during the “mob era.”)
“My beautician’s cousin’s neighbors said that their hotel room was robbed of seven thousand dollars the last time they visited Las Vegas. (My guess is that this third-hand story is partially true – they did lose $7,000.)
“Las Vegas has too many minorities to be safe.” (That’s pathetic.)
In putting this post together, I’m combining some national figures, local Las Vegas police stats, and personal experience.
Scanning the Internet, I found three “Unsafe City” sites:
Top 100 Most Dangerous Cities in America
NeighborhoodScout’s Most Dangerous Cities – 2019
50 Most Dangerous Cities in America
Las Vegas appears on none of them. North Las Vegas, a generally lower-middle-class suburb, is #71 on the NeighborhoodScout’s list (right below Wichita, KS).
Sunday’s Las Vegas Review-Journal carried an article about “cause of death” in Las Vegas. Of the 17,533 deaths in Clark County during 2018, 214 (or slightly more than 1%) were homicides. I don’t know the details of each, but based on what I’ve read and heard from criminologists, most homicides happen among acquaintances, not strangers.
Every Thursday, the RJ carries a map of crime in my part of the city (northwest Las Vegas, including Summerlin, Spring Valley, and Centennial Hills). The map from last week (December 31-January 6) was typical: no narcotics arrests or homicides, 14 assaults (again, a crime frequently happening between related parties), and 39 burglaries.
Though many of the 39 burglaries are car break-ins, I do take active steps to minimize the chances of becoming a burglary victim – or at least minimize the “damage” in case I am.
I had a great deal of knowledge about the city when I selected the neighborhood, but for those who don’t, the LVPD provides an excellent website with crime statistics via a handy map.
I purposely chose a second-floor unit, accessible by only one staircase. I know my downstairs neighbor very well and tell her when I’ll be out of town (but don’t discuss my travels on Facebook until I’m back home.) I have an alarm system, plus a camera connected to the Internet. I know the serial numbers of my TV, computer, and other electronics. I don’t keep jewelry, cash, or important documents in the apartment.
I also don’t have a gun in the house. While I have no problem with safe gun ownership, I have no interest in hunting or target shooting. As a single man living in a safe neighborhood (who comes from a family plagued by mental illness), I feel that the odds of hurting a friend, loved one, or myself (there were 495 suicides in Clark County in 2018) are far greater than needing (and having available and ready) a gun to thwart a crime.
And I still feel very safe living in Las Vegas.
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Thanks for the crime statistics website listing. It confirms my thinking as to where I may want to live. I am surprised at the lack of stats north of downtown – is that because it is really safe or ???
The area of north of downtown is North Las Vegas (which I discussed above). It has a completely separate police force – and is generally not considered a highly desirable area to live.
Just as I thought. Thanks.
David, “North Las Vegas” is a huge area. Close to downtown is a total pit, but if you’re north of Craig, or on the northwest side in general (not near Nellis AFB), then the neighborhoods are pretty good. You could stay inside the area roughly delineated by Rancho–Craig–I-15 and find some relative bargains–the same type of housing that was built in Green Valley/Henderson during the boom years, but somewhat cheaper. The areas directly north of Summerlin (inside 215) were just getting built up when the Dubya recession hit, so there is still unsold housing stock out there.
One factor that must be considered is the LV cops are both under-motivated and understaffed. When I lived there, I was the victim of several property crimes, and while I dutifully reported each one, there was never any follow-up. Most recently (last year), my car was broken into and the contents looted while it was sitting under floodlights at a locals’ casino. Security there assured me that there was camera footage of the incident. I reported it to Metro–and they never investigated it, even though the license number of the car in which the thieves drove away could be clearly seen in the surveillance footage!!
The performance of Vegas cops mirrors the general Vegas rule–the only thing that matters is the river of money flowing from the rest of the planet toward Vegas casinos, and the only real crime one can commit (or the only one Metro cares about, at least) is to somehow interfere with that river’s flow. Do NOT dip your toe into it, or you will have Metro’s full attention.
I concur, however, with the contention that Vegas isn’t any less safe than the average big city. There’s a lot of property crime due to the large number of desperate people, but I think that’s counterbalanced by the 24-hour opportunities to act out and slobber your inhibitions all over everything, which in a normal city might be directed at one’s neighbors instead. The casinos both exacerbate crime and provide a safety valve for it.
Agree with you, a few years ago our mail was stolen and our bank accounts were used to pay off several local residents utility bills and home delivery of food, so we new exactly the name and address of the criminals, yet the Las Vegas police “declined” to investigate and charge them. That just continues to encourage more burglaries and crimes.